BY
Pippa Jacks

New trade site to offer better tools for agents

Jet2holidays’ trade website is to relaunch this month as part of a £1.5 million investment in digital.

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“We had the most modern-looking website, but travel sites date quickly. The new one will be even easier to use and more modern”

The trade site, as well as Jet2holidays’ consumer site and its call centre platform, are all expected to launch in the week before Christmas.

Alan Cross, Jet2holidays’ head of trade, said the new agent site would feature improved search functionality and generate more alternative options. It also has more training built into it, and new tools to help agents communicate with customers, including a weekly email reminding agents which customers have just returned so they can get in touch to ask about their trip.

“We had the most modern-looking website out there, but travel websites date so quickly. The new site will be even easier to use and even more modern,” he said.

The changes have been made after consulting agent partners, and will be further trialled by agents in the next few weeks. “If agents aren’t happy with it, then we will postpone relaunching it until March,” he added.

Cross revealed that 85% of trade bookings are now made online.

During the course of the conference, an agent suggested Jet2holidays could list its travel agent partners in a postcode-searchable database on its consumer website, which Steve Heapy, chief executive of Jet2.com and Jet2holidays, said the operator had started looking at straight away.